Proof.

  I don’t know why I was still sat crosslegged on the mud floor of the Nepalese orphanage´s dining room when I had long finished the dahl baht. Maybe I had free time with no duties; maybe I was sat in Mandukasana – the Frog pose – to help digestion; maybe I was just being plain lazy. What I do know is that I was sat quietly, motionless, gazing through the door and marvelling to myself how the corn seed, that had been planted around the time of my arrival, had grown to be a couple of meters tall, how the heads were beginning to look like something I could imagine eating, with butter.  
 

Dhananjay, Sumitra and Namita in the Ashram´s Dining Room.
Curiously they are sitting exactly where I was in this story.
The door is to their 2 o´clock (right)



Rishi had come to the ashram a month before. He had travelled a brave, difficult path, for after marriage, he had felt the need to embark on a spiritual life, which his wife was unprepared to follow. It had lead to their physical separation which, presumably especially in Nepalese culture, was an extremely delicate situation. We spoke about it a little, about his hurt, how it laced into his joy of finding this spiritual path.

 

Rishi, I and a few others, did yoga in the morning together under the we-would-like-to-say “expertise” eye of Doctor Gopal at 6 am: which in Nepal is late. The children, my little children as I mother-duckingly felt towards the end, were up at 5am with their yoga. I was so proud of them! I was only just able to crawl out of bed with Gopal knocking at my door at 5.45 am for communal tea and biscuits in my bedroom. That is when I realised that: 1) privacy is something that is within us, not without; and 2) always wear pyjamas. Anyway, Rishi and I were co-walkers for a while along the same path.

The children in the yoga hall, 5am.

   

So, I´m sat there on the mud floor looking at the green corn, and suddenly -¡click! - it is as if my vision has changed from an old grainy fuzzy film to a modern crystal clear format…the colours jump out, saturated in a greener than green, in a brilliantly dazzling green, and I don´t know if before there had been a slight breeze but I suddenly notice it, and see how the corn, so vibrant, seems to come alive and dance in that breeze, how different greens weave a pattern of sensual art, of pleasure, of being, and I am filled with joy, and want to sing the song the breeze is making. And there, in the dining room, I find that I have suddenly burst into song…I feel so connected with everything, with the corn outside shining into the shadowy room, as if live itself were right there at the doorway…and I look around, most of the children had finished eating their rice with a splattering of vegetables, and have gone to do their chores. There must have been maybe four children still - and Rishi. I look at him. He is sat with his direction towards me. I can´t remember if he has his eyes closed or not, but then we make eye contact, and I beam at him, he beams back, as if we have shared an intimate moment…and hesitatingly I say (and it is the first and last time I have ever said this to anyone):

“Have you been sending me energy?” And he replies in his Nepali accent, a little embarrassed,

“Yes, I have been sending you Reiki.” Suddenly it all makes sense!...the dancing green, the livid breeze, the burst into song. “I must apologise, you really must never send Reiki until you have sought permission. You must always ask before doing so.” He says awkwardly.

“Ohh Rishi, it was wonderful. Thank you.”

How could I have been anything other than thankful to him? And later I realise just how fortunate it was that he hadn´t asked me for the said permission - for otherwise I would have thought it was my head playing tricks again. I would never have had the opportunity to experience, innocently, those moments and the effects of someone sending me “energy”. It is an Aloe-vera soothing relief when, on that high vertigo verge of serious doubting, of wondering if this time if I really am going mad – the image of that doorway, with the corn outside, most needingly flashes back from memory in the knick of time. I can only be eternally grateful to Rishi, wherever he is, whatever he is doing, for giving me this heart-warming, sanity-saving proof. I don´t know what to call it - energy, libido (the energy of life, not just the sexual), Eros, Caritas, Spirit – who knows? But whatever it was, I know it does, it really does, exist.



Prem and Jivan collecting
cow food from the next field to the corn.